Sunsara Taylor's Blog

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Join me at: SEX SLAVERY in CAMBODIA

* Photographers JENNIFER MACFARLANE and JESSE PESTA bring back images and stories of women and girls enslaved in the brothels of Cambodia.

* They will be joined by ﻿﻿SUNSARA TAYLOR, from Revolution newspaper, who has written and spoken broadly on the liberation of women, including in a national tour "From the Burkha to the Thong, Everything Must -- and Can -- Change; WE NEED A TOTAL REVOLUTION!"

* Also speaking: AIMEE CHAN LINDQUIST from

EXIT ART, where these photographs are currently on view in the exhibition"CONTEMPORARY SLAVERY" (through August 5)

The event will take place at Revolution Books, 146 W. 26th Street
Donation requested.

Jennifer MacFarlane is a Brooklyn-based humanitarian photographer. In 2006 Jennifer traveled to Cambodia to do a story with Marianne Pearl for Glamour magazine on the brothels in Cambodia and Somaly Mam, a heroic woman who has risked her own life to rescue these girls.

Jesse Pesta is a writer, photographer and an editor at The Wall Street Journal. He has lived and worked as a journalist in New York, India, Hong Kong and small-town America. In 2009 he traveled to Cambodia as a photographer for a project on modern-day slavery published in Marie Claire.

* * *

Exit Art's "CONTEMPORARY SLAVERY" investigates various forms of contemporary slavery--from human trafficking and the sex trade; to the exploitation of farm and domestic workers, immigrants and prisoners; to sweatshop, bonded, and child labor-through a bombardment of images taken by leading photojournalists documenting this issue.

Monday, July 25, 2011

"The whole point of principle is that you have to fight for it when it is not easy to do. There is no need for principle if the only time you apply it is when it doesn't matter." Bob Avakian -- from BAsics

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

A determining focal point in the battle for abortion rights and the lives of women begins July 31 in Germantown MD. One of the most courageous and prominent abortion providers in the country is being targeted by one of the most hateful, fascistic, anti-woman groups in the country. Anyone who cares about the future for women needs to be there or find a way to support those who will be.

Dr. LeRoy Carhart is a hero. He provides abortions. As simple as that may sound – and as simple as that ought to be – this means that every day for more than two decades he has risked his life for the lives of women. He’s been threatened. He’s been stalked. His family has been harassed – even receiving calls “informing” them of his murder. Once, his farm was burned to the ground.

But that is not all.

Two years ago Dr. George Tiller, a fellow abortion provider, colleague and good friend of Dr. Carhart’s, was assassinated while attending church. In the face of this devastating loss, LeRoy Carhart stepped up even more. He expanded his practice. He opened new clinics. He spoke boldly to the national media. He not only performs, but has taken responsibility for training others in performing, some of the most complex and life-saving abortion procedures for women late into troubled pregnancies.

For all this, he has been targeted as “Enemy # 1" by the very forces responsible for Dr. Tiller’s death. From July 31st through August 7th, Operation Rescue will be bringing anti-abortion fanatics from across the country to hound and endanger Dr. Carhart, his staff, and the women he serves.

.
Operation Rescue is an organization of woman-hating, evolution-denying, theocratic, Christian fascists. They oppose all abortions. As in: even in cases of rape, incest or the life of the woman. They oppose all birth control. As in: they not only oppose pre-marital sex, they also oppose marital sex that is not aimed at procreation. And for more than two decades they have systematically targeted, prosecuted, waged character assassination against, and whipped up an atmosphere that has led to the actual assassination of some of the most selfless and heroic abortion providers in the country.

That’s right. According to the Washington Post, just months before Dr. David Gunn was assassinated by an anti-abortion fanatic, “an old-fashioned ‘wanted’ poster of Gunn was distributed at a rally for Operation Rescue leader Randall Terry” complete with a home phone number and photo of Dr. Gunn. In 1992 Operation Rescue targeted the clinic of Dr. Barnett Slepian. Later, Dr. Slepian was assassinated in his own home by a fanatic who had traveled with Operation Rescue for years. In 1991, Operation Rescue declared a “Summer of Mercy” and brought thousands of anti-abortion fanatics to blockade Dr. Tiller’s clinic, demonize his person, and create an intimidating anti-woman spectacle in the national media for weeks. Just months after Dr. Tiller was assassinated, Operation Rescue began making efforts to purchase his clinic as the site of their new headquarters!

This is the shameful and murderous history that Operation Rescue is invoking as they gear up for their “Summer of Mercy 2.0" at Dr. Carhart’s new clinic in Germantown, Maryland.

Why do they do all this? Not because they give a rat’s ass about the so-called “life of the fetus.” They do this because they are driven by the biblical mandate that women have babies – lots and lots of babies – and obediently submit to men.

The shirt reads: Jesus is the Judge, therefore: Abortion is Murder; Homosexuality is Sin; Islam is a Lie;
Evolution is a Delusion; Feminism is Rebellion; Liberalism is False Religion; and Conservativism is Pretend Salt.

According to the Bible, everything evil that has ever happened is because Eve tempted Adam into eating the “forbidden fruit.” Not only that, there was a “special curse” brought down on women. Here it is in 1 Timothy 2:11-15: “Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.”

It is this total submission of women to men that Operation Rescue is dead set on. As Dr. Carhart himself pointed out during an interview I conducted with him earlier this year, “Most women today don’t want to be a second class citizen. They want to enjoy all the rights and privileges that the world has to offer. I think the very thrust of the anti-[abortion movement] is to deny women those very rights. Abortion is a vehicle they are using to do much greater damage.”

The only “good” thing that can be said about Operation Rescue is that they clarify the issue. The movement against abortion has never been about anything but forcing women to submit to men and have babies against their will. This is true of the Christian fascists in – or seeking – political office, from Michelle Bachman and Sarah Palin to Sam Brownback and Tom Coburn. This is true of those who have introduced the largest onslaught of legislative restrictions on the federal and state level in history over just the past few months – from mandatory ultra-sounds, to requiring women to undergo “counseling” at Christian fundamentalist “clinics,” to imprisoning women whose newborns do not survive! (Yes, you read that right: several states are currently prosecuting women for the natural deaths of their newborn babies. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jun/24/america-pregnant-women-murder-charges%29

And this is a truth that is being lied about or covered over by all those – most significantly prominent Democrats like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, but also much of the pro-choice movement leadership – who are refusing to call out this fascist woman-hating for what it is. As the World Can’t Wait so aptly put it several years ago, “This whole idea of putting our hopes and energies into ‘leaders’ who tell us to seek common ground with fascists and religious fanatics is proving every day to be a disaster, and actually serves to demobilize people.”

If women are to be free they need the right to decide for themselves when and whether to have children. They need abortion on demand and without apology. They need fully scientific sex-education. They need birth control available without shame or stigma. These things are not “tragic” or “unfortunate.” They are tremendously liberating – and they are long overdue!

All of this is essential not only for women, but for humanity as a whole – for how can anyone be free when half of us are enslaved?

The future of abortion rights, the lives of women and of the safety of heroes like Dr. LeRoy Carhart cannot be left to politicians or law enforcement or “someone out there who isn’t me.” It is time – long past time – for all those to care about women to confront the fact that the future will hinge on what each of us will do.

From July 31st to August 6th World Can’t Wait and others are organizing a Summer of Trust to be a strong abortion rights presence countering Operation Rescue and standing up for the lives of women. I add my voice to theirs in calling on you to BE THERE in the streets to show your support. If you cannot be there, reach deep into your bank account and make a donation to this effort commensurate with your concern for the future.

Friday, July 08, 2011

TONIGHT! "Infidelity Keeps Us Together" Really? On what basis and to what end?

FRIDAY, JULY 8, 2011 7:00 PM

"Infidelity Keeps Us Together" Really? On what basis and to what end?

A REVOLUTION BOOKS Free Wheeling Discussion

with Sunsara Taylor & Andy Zee

The New York Times Sunday Magazine Cover Story, July 3,2011, "reconsiders marriage:"

"The mistake that straight people made," Savage told me, "was imposing the monogamous expectation on men. Men were never expected to be monogamous. Men had concubines, mistresses and access to prostitutes, until everybody decided marriage had to be egalitarian and fairsey." In the feminist revolution, rather than extending to women "the same latitude and license and pressure-release valve that men had always enjoyed," we extended to men the confines women had always endured. "And it's been a disaster for marriage." Sunday NYT Magazine 7/3/11; pg.24.

Consider this:

" . . . Imagine if, instead of being a place where people's need for love and compassion is so often frustrated and even mocked, families themselves were undergoing a radical transformation. Imagine marriages and partnerships forged on a truly voluntary basis in a context where love, respect, compassion and equality were increasingly characterizing the way people related throughout society. Imagine if people had privacy and ease of mind within their homes, but if, at the same time, everyone knew that if they experienced abuse or other forms of degradation they would be supported by society and its institutions if they came forward to expose it, struggle against it, or leave.

Imagine if people were aiming to go even further, developing new forms of community and ways in which people sustained each other, and mutually flourished together, that were increasingly breaking down and creating the basis to finally transcend the institution of family based on the narrow-and narrowing-ties of biological kinship.. . " From "The Declaration for the Liberation of Women and the Emancipation of Humanity" published by Revolution Newspaper

And,

"In many ways, and particularly for men, the woman question and whether you seek to completely abolish or to preserve the existing property and social relations and corresponding ideology that enslave women (or maybe "just a little bit" of them) is a touchstone question among the oppressed themselves. It is a dividing line between "wanting in" and really "wanting out": between fighting to end all oppression and exploitation-and the very division of society into classes-and seeking in the final analysis to get your part in this." Bob Avakian, quoted in "BAsics" Chapter 5, #18.

About Me

Sunsara Taylor is a writer for Revolution Newspaper, a host of WBAI's Equal Time for
Freethought, and sits on the Advisory Board of World Can't Wait. She has written on the
rise of theocracy, wars and repression in the U.S., led in building resistance to these
crimes, and contributed to the movement for revolution to put an end to all this. She takes
as her foundation the new synthesis on revolution and communism developed by Bob
Avakian. You can find her impressive verbal battles with Bill O'Reilly and various
political commentary on things from abortion to religion to cultural relativism by searching “Sunsara Taylor”
on youtube.